(1) Introduction - Lincoln's Second Inaugural, March 4, 1865

   The mixed crowd of white and black people who attended Lincoln’s second inauguration, March 4, 1865 represented a dramatic and abrupt change in the United States.  People at previous gatherings would have been shocked because 1865 was the first time in the nation’s seventy-six year history that Black Americans were included in the celebration.  They showed the excitement and enthusiasm of the newly invited as they lined Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House to the Capitol. The military parade included formidable black units.  More people stood on the mall to hear the Inaugural Address.  They pointed proudly at the recently completed dome on top of the capitol building.  People were aware that they were about to witness an importnat moment in history.  
   A distinctive man stood out in the crowd.  Taller, more stiff and focused than most, he was an easily recognized celebrity.  Those standing close to him wanted to respect his privacy but they sensed an opportunity for a personal encounter.  They would tell the story for the rest of their lives.  Still, his reputation for formality and severe countenance did not invite a casual touch on the arm and "how ya doin?"  So the not entirely meek around him tried to get him, to come to them.  They spoke louder than usual and engaged in what they hoped was provocative conversation.     

   "It feels like things are picking up for the first time since the victories at Vicksburg and Gettysburg two years ago.  Grant’s army is close to Richmond and Sherman is cutting through the South.  Those rebels are not feeling so good about starting this war anymore."

   "I hear that 180,000 black men have enlisted in the army and they are performing admirably in battle. The war will soon be over.   The death of over one half million soldiers will not be for naught."

   The celebrity did not respond.

   One man, more emotional than the rest forgot that their conversation was a game to get the celebrity engaged.  He spoke with genuine anger and frustration, "What about those black soldiers, what about the slaves, what will Lincoln and his gang do about them?"

   That one hit the target.  

   Frederick Douglass, escaped slave, radical abolitionist and consultant to the President of the United States turned.  They looked directly at him.  He was physically imposing and intense.  To those who did not know him he was very serious and direct.  His appearance suggested that he would deliver an emotional response but he had been provoked for much of his life and knew how to control himself.  He was even and articulate.  He had their complete attention.  

   "An amendment to the constitution to abolish slavery, an outrageous consideration four years ago, is well on its way to becoming law.  The nation is putting its house in order.  Many in the north accepted the war for the purpose of preserving the union but many others fought because of slavery; certainly most in the south did so.  And now the abolition of slavery is also a mandate from which the majority of those in the north will not retreat.  This government, this president will not retreat.  I will not allow it."  
   There was a silent moment for those who heard him while the experience was memorized and their attention returned to the larger world.  They recognized that they had a story to tell for the rest of their lives.  No one responded.

   Douglass turned back to the podium

  

    Lincoln gave the Inaugural Address and the crowd on the mall dispersed.   Citizens were traditionally invited to greet the President at the White House after the inaugural.  Five thousand  lined up for the privilege.  The White House and its inhabitants were formal for the occasion.  It was crowded with the nation’s elite and with the public, happy for the opportunity to share a few words with the President. 
   Lincoln was pleased with the day and unusually so with his address; he looked forward to meeting with the public.    

(2) Inaugural Reception, Lincoln Recalls Life In Indiana

   The center of activity was the East room which contained the life sized portrait of George Washington.  With his arm held out in welcome Washington appeared to invite each individual into the room.  Lincoln was shaking the hand of a near stranger and asking about his wife by name.  Confident and gracious, he remembered many of their stories.  He would not acknowledge the fact but he liked it when the men he was addressing smiled because the President of the United States cared enough to know about them.  Mrs. Lincoln’s jealousy was well known to be capricious and could lead to humiliating scenes but she was out of the room so the President was also enjoying the attention of the ladies present.

   Suddenly, raised voices were heard in a corner of the room by a door.   Everyone knew that the President had received many death threats and for a moment the room fell silent and still.  Lincoln felt his neck warm and his pulse quicken.  With the threat of violence he automatically became an experienced frontiersman again; senses heightened he was aware of the hiss of the gaslights, the perfume of the ladies and the tight collar of his shirt.  Lincoln looked over the crowd into the corner and focused.  Today had been an excellent day, but would this be the day?

   There was no threat.  He understood.  The commotion was Frederick Douglass escorted by White House guards who presumed that a black man was not welcome at a White House social event.  But here was Douglass exercising his right as a citizen to shake the hand of the President.  Lincoln was glad to see him and felt that he knew him better than would be expected after only meeting two times.   He happily anticipated the brief conversation they would have.  But would Douglass get the jump on him again?  Seeing him always triggered a childhood memory of Lincoln’s.  He would be diverted by the memory of an Indiana drama and lose his focus.

   Lincoln recalled the first time they met in August of 1863; he was deep in concentration focusing on a tall pile of papers for his review and signature.  His secretary was introducing him to someone and Lincoln didn’t want to lose his place so he glanced just above the paper he was reading and saw the muscled torso of a man with his hands behind his back.  The man’s posture somehow expressed distance and disapproval.   Lincoln felt the presence of his father. 

    Thomas Lincoln was a talented, intelligent and physically impressive man with a sharp sense of humor.  Raised on the edge of civilization in Virginia, the six year old Thomas witnessed the murder of his father and was nearly killed himself in an Indian raid.  Held by an attacker poised to kill him with a knife Thomas was saved by a fortunate rifle shot from his older brother Mordicai.  His life changed, with no inheritance or education the discontented teen aged Thomas moved to Kentucky.   He learned to defuse disappointment by curbing his ambition.  Still, he soon had a family of his own and thanks to a government seizure of Indian lands, a home and land in southern Indiana.  Thomas Lincoln did not get along with his son.  He did not understand how it was that Abraham aimed for a life different from the near subsistence frontier farming life they shared. 

   Abraham Lincoln did not complain about his difficult life on the frontier but it was not one that he ever desired for himself.  The land was beautiful but also hard and unforgiving.  He suffered losses.  His mother had been supportive of his intellectual inclinations.  He later wrote that any admirable qualities that he had came from her.  At the age of nine he helped to make her casket after she died suddenly.  His older sister, the person with whom he shared the most memories died in childbirth when he was nineteen.  Hard labor was constant.  Before he was ten years old he was handed an ax and told to clear a forest for farming.  He had perhaps a single year of cumulative school.  The land was so primitive he heard panthers screeching and bears trying to get after the pigs in the night just outside their crude log cabin.  He was different.  Early on he could see that he did not enjoy hunting, drinking and church functions.  These were activities in which his neighbors spent so much time and found so much pleasure and satisfaction.  And no matter how independent his efforts, any money he earned went to his father.   

  Thomas Lincoln was uncomfortable with his son wanting to know more than he could teach him and he thought his son too ambitious.  Thomas was clever with words and would point out where Abraham fell short of his ambition.  Angry, humiliated, keeping his secret to himself, the younger man would count the days until at the age of twenty-one he could leave his father behind.   Years later Lincoln refused to visit his dying father.  His father, the only individual with whom the adult Abraham Lincoln would be cruel.  

  Now a parent himself he was aware of the view from the other side of the fence.  Lincoln learned that it was an acquired taste to find joy in your child’s choices.  Your first inclination is to expect the child to choose what you want him to choose, to be disappointed when he does not.  It took Lincoln a while to decipher that a child’s experience of life could be different from his parents yet just as valid.   His relationship with his first child, Robert, now a college student suffered for it.  Lincoln was much more comfortable and warm with his younger children; with them he delighted in their delight. 

   The memories of his father and their frontier life were complex.  Lincoln had written a poem:  

                                  “My childhood’s home I see again

                                   and sadden with the view.

                                   And still as memory crowds my brain

                                   there’s pleasure in it too.” 

    There were also good memories.  In Indiana he began to discern that his physical and intellectual abilities were considerable. He could tell a story as well as his father.  A typical frontier childhood afforded great opportunities for fun.  His poem notes, “scenes of play and playmates loved so well”.  With the son of a local store owner he built a flatboat, loaded it with produce and navigated the Mississippi River eventually selling the goods in New Orleans. When Lincoln with his family left Indiana just after he turned twenty he was experienced for his age, confident and ambitious.

 

(3) "I am Frederick Douglass"

   The man introduced himself to Lincoln, “I am Frederick Douglass.”  Everyone knew about the man born Fred Bailey, the escaped slave, self taught, brilliant, imposing gentleman and indefatigable abolitionist.  It was acknowledged but not discussed that Douglass’ father was a white man, his master.  He never discussed this relationship which must have been one of the most punishing and formative in his life.

    Douglass’s mother, Betsey Bailey lived on a neighboring farm.  As a small child he was raised by his grandmother, Harriet Bailey.  His mother saw him when she could but there was a physical price to pay for trying to be a parent when you were also a slave.  She would walk for miles at the end of a hard day to spend a few hours with him and then leave in the middle of the night.  If she returned late for work the following morning it would mean a beating.   Douglass barely acknowledged her death when he was still a small child. 

   Recognized as an unusually intelligent child and perhaps to remove him from the sight of the slave owner’s wife he was treated to experience life outside the plantation, in Baltimore.  There he was a constant companion to a young master who attended school.  At great risk Douglass also learned to read and write and obtained books to study.  Later as a teenager back on the plantation he got into trouble for trying to teach other slaves how to read and for planning an escape.  He was sent to a man named Covey who was well known for breaking slaves.  It did not take long before Douglass was being whipped for a trivial offense; he could not tolerate the injustice of his life and fought back.  Like Jacob of the Old Testament on the eve of his reckoning he wrestled for hours with the embodiment of his fate.  Douglass’s hands tightened on the surprised man’s throat, his fingernails drawing blood.  Eventually they both agreed to let go. It was a revelation to Douglass that the fight was never reported.  He reasoned that it would have meant too great a loss of respect for Covey.  Douglass’s life took order that day.  He could not help being born a slave and he might do the work of one, but whether he would be a slave was a decision that was up to him.  Like Jacob he battled his Lord and survived and like Jacob the act of resistance changed him.  In his mind he was no longer a slave; he was a man and it would only be a matter of time before he would escape physically and take a new name. 

   Douglass took every impediment in his life as a challenge, they became opportunities and he moved on.  He rose to international prominence as a great orator for abolition and published his own newspaper.  That someone as accomplished as Douglass could exist challenged everyone’s notions about the potential of black people. 

   Lincoln had first heard of him nearly twenty years before when Douglass spoke at an abolition meeting in Pendleton, Indiana which turned into a full blown riot.  Douglass and the two other speakers had to defend themselves against a murderous mob.  Douglass was seriously injured and his right hand was broken and would never completely heal.   The incident was always close in his memory and he would constantly work to be in good physical condition.   He lifted weights in his bedroom to be ready for the next attack.       Douglass had been highly critical of Lincoln in his newspaper and in speeches for as long as Lincoln had been a national figure.  Lincoln did not take the criticism personally and was looking forward to meeting him.  But for now, Lincoln kept his extensive knowledge of Douglass to himself.  “I know who you are, Seward has told me all about you”.

(4) Douglass Wonders Which Lincoln He Will Meet

   Douglass was not sure what to expect from Lincoln, a man who grew up in a region where gross bigotry was normal and racial discrimination institutionalized.  Black people could not attend public schools or testify in court against a white.  They could not marry a white person; they could not vote. 

   Lincoln had made it clear throughout his public life that he was strongly anti-slavery but only as far as the constitution allowed.  The constitution allowed slavery in the original southern states and so would he, expecting it to end on its own eventually.  Great Britain had only abolished slavery in1838.  When the war began he favored a traditional popular plan of gradual emancipation with compensation to the owners and colonization of the freed slaves to another country, perhaps in Africa, the Caribbean or Central America.   Lincoln had recently met with Black leaders to extol the virtues of voluntary colonization.  He felt that as a political goal emancipation was completely dependent on colonization.  When the Black leaders showed little interest in cooperating Lincoln lost his patience and considering the source said something incredibly hurtful.  His words would become public and encourage racism.  He said that Negroes were the cause of the war and by not volunteering for colonization they were exhibiting a lack of courage.  Putting the blame on the slave, not slavery was highly insensitive and illogical.   Questioning the courage of the black man was an insult felt personally by Douglass.  He still felt the sting. 

   Yet Lincoln would not allow slavery to extend beyond the original slave holding states to the new territories and to this end he was leading the nation in a terrible civil war.  In 1837 Lincoln wrote a paper as a member of the Congress of the State of Illinois.  The paper was anti abolition, the popular stand but he began by saying that slavery was wrong which was a radical position at the time.  Only one other congressman out of 95 would sign the paper.  In 1849 while serving in Washington as a congressman from Illinois he introduced legislation to outlaw slavery in the District of Columbia where it was not protected by the constitution.   Lincoln was not known to harbor prejudice against men of any race in his personal relationships.  He was highly principled, intellectual and through his well publicized debates with Stephen Douglas, Lincoln was the spokesman for progressive slavery politics. 

   Lincoln had a well developed and strategically utilized sense of humor.  It was well known that when he did not respect the nature of a visitor’s request at the White House he would embark on a long story rather than respond directly.  Douglass also had an excellent sense of humor but he hoped that he would not have to listen to a funny story from Lincoln.  His visit today, to be among the first Black men invited to the White House was too meaningful, his business too serious.  And yet Douglass recalled a story about Lincoln the day of his marriage.  On his way to the ceremony in Springfield, formally attired and appearing depressed Lincoln was asked by a neighbor boy where he was going.  Lincoln replied, “To hell I suppose”.  Douglass still smiled at that one.

   Could Douglass work with a man of such contradictions?  They both believed in the United States.  Its way of life was unique and allowed them to escape the poverty into which they were born.  They understood that, “All men are created equal” means that they have equal opportunity to do with their lives what they will.  They had both suffered emotionally as children and craved respect.

(5) Lincoln and Douglass, First Contact

   Douglass was very active in the recruitment of black men into the union army and he was concerned about their treatment.  Lincoln knew the issues but allowed him to take his time and listened to Douglass articulate the problems in his unique way.  He studied the man before him and could not help but recall a book that had fascinated him in the early 1850’s, “The Vestiges of Creation”.  The anonymous Scottish author posited from scientific observation that despite traditional thought, all of the human races come from the same original source, even the most different, the Africans.  He proposed a scientific interpretation of creation.  The universe, our earth and life developed, evolved over time through the wisdom of providence.  Many Americans believed that Frederick Douglass was a very formidable and talented mimic who could only pretend to have the attributes of a civilized white man.  Lincoln believed in the sense of "the Vestiges" and understood Douglass to be an original; now face to face he came to respect him even more.  Douglass had a large fund of knowledge, he was logical and creative.  They understood each other easily although they didn’t always agree.      

   Douglass also became more comfortable as he discerned that his conversation with the President was about substance, an honest exchange of views.  Lincoln first heard him out about equal pay and opportunities for black soldiers to become officers.  Douglass was surprised that he was not interrupted and by Lincoln’s direct and honest response that just having black soldiers was difficult to digest for many people.  Continued good performance would eventually get them equal pay and opportunity.  Then they discussed the confederate’s threat to kill any captured black soldiers and the option of executing captured confederates in retaliation.  Lincoln could not stomach it, killing someone for another’s crime.  Lincoln’s pain at the prospect was palpable and though Douglass did not agree with him, he understood that the decision was about morality, not racism.  

   Lincoln then mentioned a recent speech by Douglass. He quoted Douglass from memory where he said what concerned him most was the “tardy, hesitating and vacillating policy of the President of the United States.”  Lincoln was not upset but wanted Douglass to know that once he made up his mind he would not change it. Douglass was surprised that the President of the United States had cared to study his speeches; he had never experienced such openness and respect, equipoise, from a white man of great power.  

   Lincoln was also impressed and would say that “Douglass is one of the most meritorious men in America”.  Despite the considerable public criticism Douglass had heaped on Lincoln for several years, there was something familiar and comfortable about his manner.  Douglass was to the point, articulate and pleasant, a rare combination in Washington, let alone in an escaped slave. “The Vestiges of Creation” allowed that it was not possible for a race to develop high civilization if its members were mired in subsistence living.  Lincoln knew that lesson from his own life.  Douglass knew it too; he believed that he only became the man he was after he accepted the support and company of the members of the abolition movement. The irony was not lost on Lincoln that even more than himself, Douglass was a living demonstration of the possibilities for a talented man no matter how humble his origin in a free country.  Their first meeting was concluded.  As they stood Lincoln smiled and in his open country fashion said “Douglass, never come to Washington without calling upon me.”

(6) What If We Lose the War?

   Lincoln met with Douglass for the second time in August, 1864.  Before he even walked into the room something about Douglass resonated with Lincoln and invoked the powerful memory of his childhood friend and confidante Mathew Gentry.  Lincoln was as usual working in his office, he felt more comfortable and able to focus at work.  There was a roomful of people softly talking in the next room waiting to see him when one voice rose above the others.  “My name is Frederick Douglass”.  Lincoln recognized the resignation in the tone immediately, the words had less meaning.  When you have to respond but know that anything you say or the way you say it will be misinterpreted badly, that the person to whom you are speaking has already made up his mind to light into you, you learn to use that even, straightforward, flat tone.  He knew that someone in the waiting room was giving Douglass a hard time but Douglass was experienced and kept himself in control.  If you refuse to react you can diffuse tension, the other guy will relax, your father will not turn away or make fun of you, and your wife will not make a bigger scene.

   Gentry used that tone when he would introduce himself, and he introduced himself frequently.  It was odd but whether someone asked for his name or where is father was or if he thought it was going to rain he would reply “I am Mathew Gentry” in that funny flat tone and then answer the question.  It was as though he thought the words had extra meaning.  Lincoln would laugh and eventually everyone became convinced that Gentry did it just to entertain him.  That was until Gentry, still a teenager, without provocation, became a raving lunatic.  He fought with his father and tried to hurt his mother and himself.  When that terrible day ended Lincoln saw his best friend screaming and uncomprehending, tormented, tied to a tree.  He did not recognize his people and from then on always used that flat voice.  Lincoln eventually lost track of him.  Certainly he never lived on his own, never loved and never had a family.  Lincoln was terrified by the memory, nothing made him feel more vulnerable. Gentry was a good friend, they were well matched when they discussed serious matters and on those rare occasions when they went to school.  Gentry’s fall was so complete and without obvious cause.  Are we all so fragile, is our hold on reality so tenuous?  How could he drink, how could he lose control and be like Mathew Gentry?

     The last twelve months of Lincoln’s presidency had been powerfully transforming.   Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, gave the Gettysburg Address and started to discuss Reconstruction. The Thirteenth Amendment which would abolish slavery was working its way through Congress. But he was sure to lose the upcoming election because the war was going very badly; the number of casualties unimaginable.  Lincoln was losing the country’s moral pulse for the war.  He finally relented to constant haranguing for peace negotiations which he believed were insincere.  He said that he was open to them only while it was understood that preserving the union and the end of slavery were non- negotiable starting points.  However, the country was not ready to articulate that this was a war to end slavery, far from it.  General McClellan, the likely Democratic candidate and victor in the upcoming election would not fight a war to end slavery.  If the Democrats won it was likely that the union would be dissolved and slavery placed on more firm ground than ever.  The loss of life would have been in vain, the nation’s moral progress erased.  There were crushing early morning moments when unable to sleep, he would lye in bed and feel overwhelmed by the nightmare that was the Civil War.   Waiting for the sun to rise, with no one to be brave for Lincoln felt that he was the one tied to a tree, raving, not understanding.   
   Lincoln was suffering greatly in public opinion and needed to reconnect with the people in order to lead them.  He would try to find a way to reach them, he just was not sure how. 

   Lincoln considered how his life would be after he lost the election.  He wondered if he would return to Springfield or take a trip to Europe and the Holy Land.  He was so curious to see those foreign places, talk to the people and study their ideas.  But his presidency would be forever known as a catastrophe, the vast shedding of blood for nothing.  To leave the country would be a greater humiliation than to stay.  All those slaves left in the South would remain so.  The weight of failure and depression was too much to bear.  Work helped him to persevere.  There was still much they could do.  Lincoln had Douglass invited in for their second meeting.

(7) We Must Do Something About The Slaves Left Behind

   When Lincoln and Douglass met for the second time it was Lincoln who initiated the discussion.  He explained the need to respond to conservative Northerners who were concerned that the war was turning into a contest over abolition.  If this were true they would withdraw their support.   Lincoln had written a letter that he wanted Douglass to read.  But Douglass was too shocked by Lincoln’s appearance, the deepening lines in his face, the palpable depression and the dimming of the light in his eyes.  He lost track of what Lincoln was saying and was not sure what to do with the paper in his hands.  He started to read by habit and was shocked back to the task at hand.  He realized that he was being asked to offer an opinion about the utility of the letter, it was intended for publication.  The letter was addressed to those who were concerned that Lincoln had expanded the war, to make it about abolition.  Douglass was disgusted with the appeasing tone, it indicated that Lincoln could not go back on emancipation because of expediency issues.  Where was Lincoln’s backbone, slavery was just wrong, say it.  Lincoln asked if he should send the letter.  Douglass calmed himself before answering and then said, “Certainly not”.  There are parts of the letter that may be misconstrued and you seem to say that you would not rescind the Emancipation Proclamation because it would not be legal when the real reason is because it would be a great moral wrong.  Lincoln considered in his slow way, unembarrassed.  A secretary announced that Governor Buckingham of Connecticut, an important political ally and good friend had arrived and Douglass offered to leave but Lincoln said that he had more to discuss with him, the Governor could wait.

   Lincoln paused for a moment and appeared to focus his energy, and then he spoke of those remaining enslaved.  Gaining conviction he said that even with sure defeat in the coming election, together, they could accomplish much more.     Lincoln said that if the war ends now it will be premature, all of the slaves still in bondage will remain so, only the escaped slaves behind union lines would be free. Douglass realized that Lincoln was now coming around to what he had been saying for years.  Why have slaves only escaped in the thousands, why not in millions?  Douglass said that the slave owners controlled information and most slaves probably did not know about the emancipation proclamation. If they knew about it, they did not know where to go. 

   Finding common ground they were less guarded and discovered more shared history as they talked for another hour.  Lincoln knew that his recent focus on his early years was re-introducing some of the spirit and language of the Bible into his vocabulary.  Douglass spoke the same spiritual language.  They had both been exposed to the Bible at an early age and it was one of the first books that they had learned to read.  After suffering the rejection of their respective fathers they found special comfort in selections from the Bible.  Later in their education they also came to accept the thinking of the Enlightenment and the natural rights of man.  They understood its expression in the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. Thankful to the United Sates they knew with absolute certainty that anywhere else in the world they would have remained for all of their lives as they were born, peasant and slave.

   Would Douglass organize a group to go into the South behind enemy lines, to educate the slaves about the possibility of escape and freedom? To help them leave in large numbers?  It would be very dangerous.  Douglass understood and accepted.  He also understood Lincoln and the politics of the presidency better.  
   Governor Buckingham, distinguished and amiable was finally shown into the office.  Lincoln never sent the letter.  Douglass would never stop criticizing policy but he would no longer directly criticize Lincoln.

   Much to his surprise Douglass realized that he and Lincoln were working together as equals with a shared goal.  He was flattered with his new position beside the president in history and eager to formulate strategy.  Leaving the office he recalled a particular scene in the play, Julius Caesar.  Brutus and Cassius lead an army to war in an effort to save the Roman Republic from Caesar’s dictatorship.  After planning their decisive battle, mutually sure of their cause but uncertain of their survival Brutus says to Cassius, “if we see each other again we will smile, if not this was a parting well made.”